Some existing accommodation reservation systems, such as bed and breakfast reservation systems, or alternative lodging reservation systems, allow users to post accommodation offers for lodgings that they own or occupy. From single rooms in an apartment to entire castles, web services such as Airbnb™ or HomeAway™ let users offer their lodgings and showcase it to an audience of millions. In most cases, users of the accommodation reservation systems are not professional hoteliers and use the revenues obtained through the accommodation reservation system as a secondary income.
Accommodation reservation systems also let other users seeking for accommodation to obtain a unique travel experience by offering an unconventional type of lodging. Accommodation reservation systems match users looking for short term accommodation needs with other users seeking to rent their lodgings.
Users offering their accommodations to others enter information about the accommodation as well as information about the availability of the accommodation on various dates. Although the information provided is usually accurate, some information, such as the availability needs to be periodically updated. In most cases, the user posting an accommodation offer is responsible for keeping the availability information up to date, indicating which dates the accommodation will or will not be available. However, existing systems do not provide any way of ensuring that users in fact keep the availability information current. Since, for most users, the accommodation reservation system is not their primary source of income, they update their listings information sporadically. This may cause a user seeking for accommodation to obtain, in a search result, listings that seem to be available for the desired time period but that in reality they are unavailable. Users will then waste time reviewing listings that are do not match their needs. Those users may also request accommodation from those listing and/or send messages requesting additional information to the user posting the listing. This will reduce the confidence of the user requesting accommodation on the accommodation reservation system and might also decrease the likelihood that the user will get an accommodation through the accommodation reservation system.